Friday May 1, 2026
– Full Moon Phase (@10:11 PM) – illumination, realization, fulfillment, shadow, relationships, experience
– Moon in SCORPIO –
– Retrogrades – NONE – We are in the clear until May 6 when Pluto goes Retrograde in Aquarius
– Best Days (from the Farmer’s Almanac) – May 1st – 2nd – Can Fruits and Vegetables, Mow to Slow Growth, Prune Trees, Go Hunting, Jar Jams/Jellies, Slaughter
– Planting Calendar (from the Farmer’s Almanac) – May 1st – 2nd – Plant seedbeds. Good days for transplanting. Plant carrots, beets, onions, turnips, and other root crops. Also good for leafy vegetables.
– Sabian Symbol for the Solar-Lunar Year: – 28 ARIES: a large, disappointed audience
– Aspect of the Aeon Sophia: (Wisdom): Kali – The Destroyer
– Aspect of the Aeon Thelete: (Will/Desire): Ian, God of the East
SUN – 12 TAURUS: a young couple walk down Main Street window shopping
EARTH – 12 SCORPIO: an official embassy ball
I Was Strolling Through the Park . . .
May Day is an odd “observance here in the west. For one, most of the “holiday” part of the date comes as a result of pagan religions that reach back thousands of years (before JC). And let’s face it. The Romans (ie Catholicism) have done everything in their power to erase it from the memory of mainstream thought..
As a result of all of their efforts, we in the west are uncomfortable with Blood Sacrifice. And we are taught to be ashamed of fertility rituals. And since that is what May 1st is all about, as I said, its complicated.
And despite all their efforts, the date still is recognized around the world.
Mayday
As stated by wikipedia:
May Day is a European festival of ancient origins marking the beginning of summer, usually celebrated on May 1, around halfway between the Northern Hemisphere’s spring equinox and midsummer solstice. Festivities may also be held the night before, known as May Eve. Traditions include gathering green branches and wildflowers (“bringing in the May”), which are used to decorate buildings and made into wreaths; crowning a May Queen, sometimes with a male companion decked in greenery; setting up a Maypole, May Tree, or May Bush, around which people dance and sing; as well as parades and processions involving these. Bonfires are also a major part of the festival in some regions.
wikipedia
This is an amusing description because it takes into account pretty much every May first celebration throughout Europe without saying anything about it.
Beltane
I found this description a few years ago (and published it in a similar post about Beltane) on a site called Beltane.com.
The word ‘Beltane’ roughly translates as ‘bright fire’ and, as such, one of the most important rituals, which survives today in our modern festival, concerns the lighting of the Beltane bonfire. Fire was seen as a purifier and healer and would have been walked around and danced/jumped over by the members of the community. Farmers would also have driven their cattle between bonfires to cleanse and protect them before being put out into the fields.
In ancient communities, all hearth fires would have been extinguished and a new neid fire lit which would have then been used to relight people’s hearths in their own homes. In this way the community was connected to each other by the sacred fire which was central to all.
The festival would also have been a time of courtship rituals and a celebration of our own fertility!
The important point to note when thinking about our own festival is the joy and the revelry that is fostered in the ritual. It is about casting off the darkness and celebrating the light. It is a time for celebrating fertility, both in the context of our biological functions as well as our own creative energies, the fertility of our creative community.
This was a nice, cute description of the pagan holiday of Beltane. For another more graphic depiction, I recommend watching the movie The Wicker Man 1973. I have not seen the 2006 version starring Nicholas Cage. The 1973 version did a great job of it. Check it out!
Maypole
As part of the celebrations, there is often a Maypole. As Wikipedia tries to splain these:
A maypole is a tall wooden pole erected as a part of various European folk festivals, around which a maypole dance often takes place.
Maypoles were erected “simply” as “signs that the happy season of warmth and comfort had returned.” Their shape allowed for garlands to be hung from them and were first seen, at least in the British Isles, between AD 1350 and 1400 within the context of medieval Christian European culture. In 1588, at Holy Trinity Church in Exeter, villagers gathered around the ‘summer rod’ for feasting and drinking. Geoffrey Chaucer mentions that a particularly large maypole stood at St Andrew Undershaft, which was collectively erected by church parishioners annually due to its large shape.
I copied the Wikipedia tame version because it was funny – because Maypoles were used in fertility rituals. The “pole” was “erected” because it would signify a phallus (dick to all us uncouth mercans)
Mayday as a “Labour” Day
About 1918, the newly created Soviet Union declared May first as “Day of International Solidarity of Workers.”
In honor of all the workers in the world, they made the holiday mandatory for all citizens. It was used as an excuse to celebrate communism and collectivism. It featured huge displays of military might, tanks, guns, soldiers and of course huge mistles (we would assume they were nuclear.
After the breakup of the Soviet Union in the late 1980’s, they tamed it down a bit. In 1992 it was renamed to the “Holiday of Spring and Labor.” They still celebrate another military holiday on May 9th.
That all being said, the parades this year did not feature any military hardware for fear of Drone attacks.
Honestly, the biggest Labor/Workers celebrations this year were in China and by the radical left in the USA. It seems that the True Believers from the No Kings rallies held another protest day throughout the country. There were demonstrations (some violent when they realized that no one cared). But for some reason, the workers of the world did not unite as they had hoped
Walpurgis Night
Honestly for me, the biggest revelation in reading about all of this exciting observance was when I read about Walpurgis night. It is a German/Pagan observance between April 30 and May 1. There is much confusion whether it was a pagan holiday from over 1000 years ago or whether it was a Pope-Sponsored even.
My knowledge of Walpurgis was from reading about the song War Pigs from Black Sabbath. Apparently, Walpurgis was the original name and their manager or producer commented that it was too satanic. So they altered the lyrics to War Pigs. The song is now described as an anti-war song. Read the lyrics and you can decide:
Generals gathered in their masses
Just like witches at black masses
Evil minds that plot destruction
Sorcerers of death’s construction
In the fields the bodies burning
As the war machine keeps turning
In the end, I am most amused that a holiday dedicated to Spring and fertility turned into a celebration of War. And that a song written to the Fertility ritual was interpreted as an anti-war song.
So as far as I am concerned, I think we should make War Pigs the official song of May Day. Please take a few minutes to listen to it.